The Cheap Seats

Thursday, February 24, 2011

*Dunedin Students and Citizens Responding to help the Volunteer Army on the
Ground in Christchurch.
*
*For release: *Friday the 25th of February from 5.30am

*Come on Dunedin lets get 10,000 pre packed lunch bags donated by Dunedin
citizens to keep the volunteers in Christchurch going.
*
Dunedin this is your chance to help, we are responding to a specific request
for non-perishable lunch food for the University of Canterbury Students
Association (UCSA) Volunteer Student Army.

Today around 1000 Student Volunteers are out helping in the Christchurch
Community. Over the coming days there could be at least 2000 per day. UCSA
has put out a call to Dunedin for help! This is a specific request from UCSA
for lunches to keep the volunteers fed over the coming days as they respond
to non-life threatening requests for help from the wider Christchurch
community. The UCSA Student Army are liaising with Civil Defense and their
work in the wider community removes the strain from the critical response
activities of the Civil Defense and Emergency Services.

So lets keep the Volunteers on the ground in Christchurch going! Doesn't
matter if it is one bag or 100 every contribution is appreciated. We are
aiming for 10,000 pre packed lunch bags to be dropped off at the Student
Union where they will be boxed in packaging from Otago Packaging Supplies
and delivered by Northern Southland Transport to the team in Christchurch to
feed the volunteers.

*So What's the go? How can people help?
*
*Step 1: *Rally up friends and family

*Step 2:* Head to the supermarket and buy the items (or similar) from the
list that you don't have already

Sunday, February 6, 2011

We here at the Cheap Seats have always been fans of Robert Kubica. Not only is he one hell of a driver, he comes across as a genuinely nice guy and his unaffected joy at finding himself on the podium always makes us smile.

News came through this morning that he crashed his rally car in Italy and broke several bones in his right hand, arm and leg. It's looking unlikely that he'll be starting at the Bahrain GP in March.

The Brat and I send our best wishes for Robert's full, safe and speedy recovery. See you back on the track soon, sunshine.

Thursday, June 17, 2010

It was just resting, and not in that "pining for the fjords" kind of way.

Life got in the way of both my and the Brat's blog-keeping there for a while. Let's hope we've managed to fight it back into a corner long enough for something to actually happen.

And that brings me straight onto the World Cup. Of football, known to some as soccer. A game I used to play and the Brat still does, and a lot of fun to watch and speculate on whether the ref inherited his blindness from his mother or his father (whoever he is). And whether gross ignorance of the offside rule is learned or hereditary.

Sadly I haven't been watching a lot of it, because of the time zones (sometimes living in the South Pacific sucks fetid donkey balls through bendy-straws), but I do know that:

New Zealand drew with Slovakia, thereby scoring their first EVER point in the World Cup

If you point at the English goalkeeper and go "HA ha!" you can make him cry

If Argentina win, Diego Maradona has promised (threatened) to take his clothes off and run through the streets of Buenos Aires naked. Heck of an incentive there, mate. Cue Hand of God jokes.

And the other big news is that this weekend the All Blacks play Wales in the last ever test at Carisbrook. I'm going to be there, but not with bells on (I value my life) shouting at the Welsh with the rest of the rabble on the Terraces.

In keeping with our tradition of finding useful phrases in the visitors' native language, here's what I'll be yelling at them:

Ach hefyd 'n annwyl chan dafad!

You are too fond of sheep!

Pryd ewyllysia Torchwood bod 'ma?

When will Torchwood be here?

Pawb chan 'ch glo ydy berthyn i ni!

All of your coal are belong to us!

'ch fam anwyliannau Dan Certiwr hefyd!

Your mum loves Dan Carter too!

If you happen to see me at the test feel free to say hello, buy me a beer, save my spot while I make a run for Loth-loorien, whatever.

And if you know how to pronounce any of the above and/or bring me a towel (Welsh is a damp language), I'll be even happier to see you.

Monday, March 1, 2010

Unlike the Brat, I've not quite been ignoring the Olympics. Its schedule being from ohmygod o'clock in the morning until dinnertime rather meant that I didn't see much of them during the week, but it wasn't for lack of interest.

The weekends were different, and the Weasel and I spent hours watching people in full-body condoms zoom around tracks on ice skates, slide down hills with sticks tied to their feet, do aerobatics while attached to large tongue-depressers etc.

Which leads me to Yet Another List: Things That Are Fabulous.

Thing One: The Norwegian Curling Team's Trousers

Behold the magnificence

The sartorial equivalent of the loud drunk guy at your cousin's wedding, these bad boys (the pants, not the Norwegians) are available for sale for a paltry $US 89.95 per pair. If you can't quite stretch to that, you could always buy a "Respect the Pants" t-shirt for a much more accessible $US 15 or join the Facebook fan group, where you can learn to tell people how awesome their pants are in Norwegian.

And remember -- a man walks down the street in pants like those, you know he's not afraid of anything.

Thing Two: Johnny Weir

He's sparkly, he's outspoken almost to a fault, and he's ridiculously talented. Seriously. To the point where we can forgive him for being Lady GaGa's bestie.

No, really. Check it out:

As if anything else need be said. But sadly, it does. A couple of commentating velocipedes in Canadia made some crass remarks about Johnny's apparent

sexuality, including a suggestion that he should have to take a gender test.

WTF, CANADIA?? We thought you were immune to that kind of nineteenth-century homophobic bullshit.

Butanyway. Johnny, being the outspoken guy he is, had something to say about it. This is what he said:

And that, ladies and germs, is what a class act looks like. And why you, Johnny Weir, are fabulous. Long may you sparkle.